New Zealand celebrate after defeating South Africa 21-0 in the Wellington Sevens
Photo: Martin Seras Lima/IRB

by Brendan Bradford –

New Zealand has regained top spot on the IRB Sevens ladder with a convincing 21-0 win over South Africa to claim the fifth leg of the Series in miserable conditions in Wellington.

The Kiwis avenged losses to the BlitzBokke in the Las Vegas and Port Elizabeth finals with a classy win in tricky conditions courtesy of a Tim Mikkelson try and a Sherwin Stowers double in the first half.

“It’s a great, great feeling to win your own tournament. South Africa had that feeling a few weeks back and we’ve got it now,” said New Zealand coach Gordon Tietjens.

Playmaker Gillies Kaka was a standout again
for New Zealand – Photo: Martin Seras Lima/IRB

The defending Series champions lost their first match 12-7 to Fiji on Friday but didn’t concede a single point for the rest of the tournament. After a 55-0 win over Spain and a 47-0 defeat of France in the group stages, the hosts downed Canada 24-0 in the Quarter Finals and England 31-0 in the Semis to advance to the decider.

“It’s always tough in these conditions, but after our loss to Fiji which woke us up a little bit, we got our defence right and no one scored any points after that. From then on we scored a number of points against some very good teams and obviously we’re very, very pleased,” Tietjens continued.

“Defence wins tournaments and we were just magnificent on defence. I suppose what really capped it off was the final tackle of the final where we stopped them from crossing our line. It was a great, great tackle. It’s a reward for the players for gutsing it out even though the game was won with 30-seconds to go – the drive for no one to cross our line was still there.”

South Africa had easy wins over Wales and Portugal before dropping their last match in the group stages to England. On Day Two, they recorded 10-0 wins over both Australia and Fiji with talismanic speedster Cecil Afrika scoring his 100th career try.

Fiji outlasted England 14-7 in the third place play-off while Australia came from 10-0 down to beat a promising Canadian side 12-10 in the Plate Final. Crowd favourites Kenya downed Scotland 24-14 in the Bowl and a Carlin Isles doubled helped the USA to a 28-12 win over Spain in the Shield Final.

Australia celebrate after a come from behind win over Canada in the Plate Final
Photo: Martin Seras Lima/IRB

Australian coach Michael O’Connor was full of praise for his young side which only lost one game – the Quarter Final against South Africa – on their way to taking home the Plate.

“They’re a terrific young group of players these boys. They’ve got plenty of character and they don’t know when to lie down,” O’Connor said.

“Seemingly that game was over in these conditions and they found a way to win and I’m very proud of them.”

The next round is in Japan on March 22-23.

STANDINGS AFTER ROUND FIVE